Zero Irony

The Obligatory Heroes Post

I didn't want to like Heroes going into this season. It looked like yet another Smallville, a superhero show by people embarrassed to be doing a superhero show, so there wasn't going to be any costumes and it would trade more on Joseph Campbell's hero's journey and less on Jack Kirby's clobbering time. It certainly didn't didn't help that the pilot is pretentiously titled "Genesis" and the show seems to be based around a variation of the mutant gene. (as in, Mutant Gene, Why I Hate).

But it was the show on before Studio 60, which I was looking forward to (disappointingly), and I'm still as sucker for superheroes, so I tuned in to the pilot, where my low expectations were met. Except... it had that last minute twist that I honestly didn't see coming, and it had Hiro Nakamura, which made me just interested enough to catch the next episode, which made me just interested enough to catch the third, which kicked off with a moment that sealed the deal for me, but more on that later.

Heroes is a really good show. Like all great shows, Heroes greatest strength it its cast. They are across the board strong, which is impressive in a cast so large, with the noteworthy standouts of Hayden Panettiere (whom I've loved since she voiced Kairi in Kingdom Hearts) and Masi Oka.

Its second greatest strength is that the sucker moves. In a season where half a dozen shows warn their audience that there would be no resolution until May Sweeps, Heroes promises to set off a nuclear bomb in Mid-Town Manhattan in time for Veterans' Day.

And there's the cleverness with the powers. Lyle at Crocodile Caucus noticed that the badass powers, rage-powered superstrength and a hyper-healing factor bordering on immortality, belong to the women, while the men have more passive powers, telepathy, phasing, vague premonitions. The special effects are well done, especially for television and particularly the flights, which has plagued TV Supermen going back to George Reeves.

There are weaknesses. Some they've overcome: the pretentiousness of the pilot has been largely dropped or mollified. Some they haven't: both of the women have been sexually assaulted in only five episodes, and "Save the Cheerleader"? I mean, she's indestructible. Why not "Save the Emo Nurse with the MySpace Haircut?"

But I can ignore most of that because of Hiro Nakamura, the sensational character find of 2006 (sorry, Batwoman). He's easily the standout character of the show. He brings an energy to the show that drives the whole thing forward. The pilot is slow and ponderous, but the moment Hiro shouts "I DID IT!" in the middle of Times Square, with the camera orbiting him in a mad frenzy, the episode and the series comes roaring into life. (Followed up by "HERRO NEW YORK!" which is probably highly offensive, but I laughed anyway.)

A lot of critics think Hiro's appeal is that he's the fanboy made good, who knows his X-Men back issues and is excited (but not terribly surprised) to learn a future version of him exists and carries a sword. But that's not exactly it. We've seen that character before and usually, we hate him. See: Wesley Crusher (sorry, Wil Wheaton). Others say it's that he embraces his power, while the others are scared or ashamed. But Peter Petrelli embraces his power too, but I don't like him much*.

No, what makes Hiro a standout character is that he embraces being a superhero. Peter wants "to be somebody." Hiro wants to save lives. The moment for me, the moment I realized I was in, was the start of the third episode. Hiro's come back from his time traveling adventure, where he's discovered both the nuclear threat and a comic that can predict his future. But he has to cut short because "a little girls life depends on us". And he says this with ZERO IRONY.

Which is refreshing. There's just no way Buffy could have pulled off that line, or any superhero post-Adam West. It's just too spot on, too "this is what we do." But Hiro doesn't find saving lives absurd. Or even that heroic. He doesn't want praise for it, or recognition. He knows he has a power and with that power the responsibility to help people. He's already disappointed with himself for not being able to save everyone he could, and a close relative didn't need to get shot or nothing.

If the producers of Heroes were really brave, the pilot would have been just Hiro, and it would have followed his story for an hour from discovery of his powers through witnessing the bomb going off. Sure, it would have been mostly in Japanese and left a lot of the other characters in the wings, but it would have gotten most of the themes and even major plot points onto the table while hinting, with a newspaper headline here, an internet video clip there, a brainless dead body on the floor, at the other storylines. But mostly, it would have given Masi Oka more room to play. He really is delightful every time he uses his powers or asks himself "W W S-M D?" I'd be perfectly happy if the show was just about him.

And Hayden Panettiere. She's super cute.



*okay, I didn't like him much, until they revealed Peter doesn't really have a super power, he has other people's super power. It was a perfect power for Peter's personality, and made me particularly curious what happens when he finally meets Niki (and Niki's evil other half).

The Myth of "Who's Your Daddy?"

or, "Strange Women Lying in Ponds Distributing Swords is No Basis For a System of Government. "

Once again, what started as a response to Matthew has grown into an entire blog post (including a little anti-Bush rhetoric and, to my surprise, praise for Infinite Crisis). In response to my last post that Superman was in fact a working class hero and his stories are anti-classist, he wrote

Everything you say about Superman is true. But you're talking about what Superman does, and what he thinks and believes and stuff. What I was talking about is who he technically is, and who he is is, basically, the Lost Prince of Krypton. He's like Carrot in the Discworld books.

This way, the Superman writers get to have it both ways. They can draw from the alien-aristocrat superhero archetype, but they don't have to make him act like it. (Contrast: Superman, and Dr. Tachyon from the Wild Cards novels.) This may actually be one reason (out of all the many reasons) why Superman is such a great character.

I meant to respond right away, but I couldn't tell whether our disagreement over the class of Superman was a minor semantic disagreement over the definition of the word "is" (which would be too minor to even argue) or a major philosophical one over the meaning of social class and the nature of hereditary predestination. I'm going to assume it's the second, even though there is no way to do that justice in one post of my comics blog.

Matthew says that Superman, in the tradition of Oedipus, King Arthur, and Aquaman, may act as a peasant hero but he is in fact a king-in-disguise, that it is his Kryptonian genetic destiny shining through that makes him Superman. That he's a hero because of his elite genetics, no matter how much he pretends he is a commoner.

My problem with basing Superman's class on his genetics over his actions is that class is a social construct. It is only through what he and others consider him to be that we know what class he belongs to. And Superman chooses NOT to be a king (stories where Superman chooses to become a king will be ignored because they are terrible) The myth of aristocracy is that class is genetic, that some people are just born good enough to rule, and that this inherent goodness can be passed down from generation to generation (like the X-Gene!)

And Superman's own story proves the myth false. Yes, Clark's blood obviously gives him "powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men." However, what makes him a good guy can't be his blood, because Kryptonians are the assholes of SPAAAACE (below the comic).

Zod, Preus, the Eradicator, the new Kara Zor-El (possibly)... Those that come to Earth preaching the superiority of Krypton are by and large really, really bad guys. And even under the best of circumstances, Kryptonian society was ruled by arrogant morons who couldn't see their planet was falling apart despite the evidence of the best scientists of the time (cue Global Warming joke). So clearly, just being vulnerable to kryptonite isn't enough to make you better than the masses.

No, what makes Superman a hero is the choices he makes. And whenever Superman is forced to choose between the Kryptonian way and the Earth way, he chooses Earth, every time, and embraces his life as Clark Kent (the end of Kingdom Come, for example). And as long as Superman chooses to live as a middle-class employee, THAT is who he is. Jor-El and Lara may have given him powers, but it's Jonathan and Martha, his "humble" lower class parents, who made him a hero.

This is unlike almost every other superhero, by the way. Contrast Superman with Aquaman, for example. Like Superman, he was orphaned as a baby, raised in an alien world, and grew up as a human for at least part of his life (where he learned English and was christened Arthur Curry). But when Aquaman learned where he was really from, he rejected the surface world and threw in his loyalties to Atlantis whole-heartedly, in the more traditional Arthurian arch-type. (Ironically, to become King Arthur, he had to reject the name "Arthur.") Even given the chance, Superman would NEVER give up Earth to return to Krypton.

Matthew brings up Carrot Ironfoundersson of the Discworld novels, another heroic king-in-disguise who refuses to take the throne. But that, I think, argues for MY point. Discworld, after all, is a satire of the myth of aristocracy (among many other things). Most of the other characters think Carrot should rule because of his unacknowledged heritage, but those that think that way are idiots and bad guys.

The smarter characters, including Carrot himself, know he's not smart enough to run the city, nor ruthless enough to do half the horrible things he'd need to as King (or Patrician, as the position is called). That having the right name and the right daddy isn't enough, that "the right blood" is in fact close to meaningless (I'd make another joke here...). Carrot may be related to a king, but day to day it's much more important that he learned how to be good man (or dwarf, it's complicated) and can throw a strong right hook.

Carrot, of course, is a deliberate satire, and I doubt Siegel and Shuster were thinking too deeply about Jungian arch-types and Marxist rhetoric when they created their science fiction strong man, but I think Superman is a stronger character because of it. Carrot can really only be that satire: "King Arthur, but not," stuck in an old debate over the divine right of kings and dictators. Superman can be that satire and more, moving beyond that class discussion to a classless society where a man is judged only by his actions.

Which leads me to my defense of Infinite Crisis. I dropped Civil War when I realized it wasn't about anything. And while Infinite Crisis was flawed, I can tell you what it was about: the myth of heroic destiny. Superboy-Prime (and to some extent Alexander Luthor) believed he had the right, the duty, to destroy the universe and remake it in his image because of who his Kryptonian parents were, and that he would ALWAYS be in the right, always be the hero because his name was Kal-El, he was from Krypton, and he had great power. He was wrong. In the end it came down to Superman, our Superman, laying it out for him:

And, after laying Prime out, Clark lets him know what it's all about:

It's about action.

What makes Clark Kent "Superman," and not just another asshole Kryptonian, is his actions. So when judging what class Superman belongs to, whether he's an elite looking down on the masses or one of us, we can only judge him based on "what Superman does, and what he thinks and believes and stuff." Because what else is Superman, in the end, other than those things?

Tale of the Cape

Despite all evidence to the contrary, I usually don't mind bad science in my superhero comic books. I accept that it's a medium and a genre that allows fantastic and impossible things to happen. Sure, whenever possible, the medicine and science should be as accurate as possible, but if good science gets in the way of a good story, good science can kiss my ass.*

So I really don't care WHY Superman is strong or even how strong he is, all that matters is that he IS super strong, and most people are not, and that he uses that advantage to help make the world a better place. And before you tell me how xenomorphic biology works and what that has to do with solar light in a very narrow spectrum, you first have to explain how Batman's cape works.

Here's a fairly clean image of Batman, ganked off of JL.ToonZone.Net. Note in particular how long the cape is. The bottom points of the scalloping barely hit the middle of his calves, about two feet lower than his hands, more or less. Also note how the cape just kind of falls flat. There's stiffness and support around the collar, but by the bottom is light enough to by caught playfully in the breeze.

Now, in this classic image of Batman leaping to catch his prey, notice how the formally lank cape juts out stiffly to the sides to simulate wings. Capes don't do that. Without support, the cape should follow behind, like Superman's does under the same conditions. (God bless Batman Begins for trying, for at least acknowledging that something else would be required to pull that off). Also note that the cape seems to have grown by two more feet on either side as well.

The cape grows even longer when Batman wants to stand there looking scary and menacing. Suddenly, a cape which barely hit the top of his boots completely covers his feet and can be wrapped around him like a shroud. Before you explain how Superman flies, explain how Batman, master of every martial art known to man (and martian), doesn't trip over this extra long thing every time he throws a round house kick!

Answer:

CHEATING!

The artists "cheat" the size and shape of the cape for dramatic effect, of course. Just as the writer "cheats" the science to get the dramatic story effect he's going for. And I don't mind. In fact, I appreciate it. I don't read superhero comics looking for realism. (I'm not looking for escapism either, that's something different.) I'm looking for stories about things that CANNOT happen here, and maybe SHOULD NOT happen here, and how that effects people.

And Batman would be a hell of a lot less scary if his feet were poking out the bottom of his cape.

*(The mutant gene, by the way, I consider bad science pretending to be good science, getting in the way of a good story).

Why I Hate the Mutant Gene

I hate the concept of the gene for mutant powers, or "X-gene", in X-Men comics. It's stupid and it leads to bad stories and muddled meanings, but I specifically hate it for four reasons. The first is scientific, the second semantic, and both are pretty petty and pedantic, but they tie into the third, substantive reason, so I'll try to get through them quickly to get to the fourth.

1. The Mutant Gene Doesn't Act Like a Gene.

A gene is a specific sequence of DNA that codes for a particular physical characteristic. A particular gene might determine whether your eyes are blue or black, but that same gene in another person won't give him stronger back muscles. Even taken to the exaggerated superhero level, the same gene can't give one guy the ability to fire lasers out his eyes and another guy fully functional wings!*

2. An X-Gene Means "Mutants" Aren't Mutants.

A mutation is a change in a gene, a mutant is a changed gene or organism arising from that changed gene. The key here is change. A mutated gene is one you did NOT get from your parents, that you have and your siblings don't. If the "mutant" gene is shared among individuals, if it is inherited, then it is, by definition, no longer a mutant, and a person who exhibits traits associated with that gene is not a mutant either.

But both of those complaints are really nerdy. After all, when you're dealing with pulp science fiction, you have to put up with some bad science and mangled language as plot devices. But the reason the "mutant" gene bothers much more than does its DC equivalent the "meta-gene" is because it's a plot device that hurts the plot it's try to support:

3. The Mutant Gene Undermines the Metaphorical Power of X-Men.

At its core, X-Men is about individuals, shunned and rejected by society at large, alienated from everyone, who come together to form a new family of choice in order to survive, thrive and relate back to the larger world. Now, whether that's an allegory for racial politics, homosexuality, or teenage rebellion in general, who better to play the role of the outcast than a LITERAL mutant, someone who, on a genetic level, is cut off from his own family? And that the X-Men don't share DNA in common, that they are connected by their otherness from everyone in the world, including each other, makes their new family bond all the more meaningful, a celebration of our shared humanity over our superficial differences.

If Marvel "mutants" are not literal mutants, however, if they inherited their power from some rare recessive gene, then they would still have a family connection. Maybe not their parents, but an aunt or distant cousin should be a "mutant" too. If there is a mutant gene, then it doesn't make sense for it NOT to run in families. And if their "mutant" gene connects them to their family rather than dividing from their family, then the power of the metaphor is severely weakened.**

And if "mutants" share a specific gene, then it seriously weakens the idea of the X-Men as a family of choice. "Mutants" are a lot closer to being a new species, united by their shared genetic identity, rather than simply humans who have happened to have the odd quirk in their genetic structure. You lose the sense of people defying their genes to find each other, and gain an unheroic doom of a group giving into it's collective genetic destiny.

And then there's the fact that:

4. The Mutant Gene is Completely Unnecessary to Explain the X-Men.

Mutation is REAL thing. Mutants happen all the time and in fact you almost certainly have a few mutant genes in you. But only a very small percentage of mutations have any noticeable effect on the body at all, and 99% of those that do cause cancer or are pre-natally fatal.

BUT... in the Marvel Universe, things that would cause cancer or instant death in our world, like MASSIVE DOSES OF RADIATION, instead grant superpowers. So superpowered mutants would be the natural byproduct of such a world. So instead of having a "mutant gene" which 1. doesn't make scientific sense, 2. is a contradiction in terms, and 3. undermines the story you are trying to tell, you could just leave it at "They're mutants," AND BE DONE WITH IT!



*And don't give me Byrne's "they all DO have the same power, to 'warp reality,' they just warp it differently," because that still doesn't answer WHY one warps reality by controlling the weather and the other warps reality by being really fat. *



**The worst was a line in X-Men 2, where Pyro tells Iceman's mother that the X-gene is carried by the father, not the mother. The only way that can happen is if the X-gene is on the Y chromosome. This is doubly stupid, because a) it means only people with Y chromosomes could have mutant powers, and Rogue is sitting right there! And b) the Y chromosome cannot carry a gene without expressing it, so Iceman's father and brother should be "mutants" too, and they aren't.**